Southern Oregon Lesbian Lands

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About the Collection

This collection is made to function as an archive for sources related to the Lesbian Lands movement of Southern Oregon. The Lesbian lands movement came out of the Back to the Lands movement of the 1960s and 1970s, and is based around lesbian femenist culture. This movement was pioneered by groups of lesbian women who were loooking to find alternative livestyles outside of capitalistic, patriarchal, norm culture. Many of these communities were based in Southern Oregon, with over twelve still operating to this day, a near fifty years later. Some of the most prominent lands were Rootworks, Oregon Women’s Land Trust (OWL), Cabbage Lane, Rainbows End, Raven Song, We’moon Land, Womanshare and Fly Away Home. In addition, many of the women involved in the lands produced art, photogrpahy, literature, and ran independent presses to distrubute their work and share their goals and interests nation wide.

Their mission was to create safe spaces for women, specifically lesbian women to reconnect with themselves and the natural resources that the land had to offer. Many of these women had professional and academic backgrounds and were politically active in other widespread liberation movemments, like Civil Rights and Gay liberation. This movement sought to find liberation for lesbian sexuality, expression, and lifestyles as well as remove themselves from a hetero-normative binary and patriarchal systems of oppression. Many lands were formed to be seperatist communities, not allowing men to live on their lands. This was with the intention to seperate themselves from masculine culture and oppressive structures. For many women, this was an opportunity to heal from previous traumas in an exclusively female space. It also created safe queer spaces to build community at a time when there was little to no opportunity to find queer community in mainstream spaces, especially for women.

The movement attempted to remove themselves from mainstream consumerism and governmental structure. They placed importance on living off the land and reconnecting with natue. They promoted interaction with alternative economies, like localized farming, and supporting lesbian-owned businesses. One document in the collection shows a directory of resources for lesbian women, including lesbian owned bookstores and restaraunts. Most of the lands functioned in an egalitarian community based system, based in consiousness of yourself and others.

“They dreamed of finding lesbian femenists out West, women they could share their lives with. They made a strong commitment to each other , a commitment to buy land together. Their lesbiansim and the belief that women could and should create new ways of being and working togtehr made it possible for them to make such a commintment.”

-A quote by Nelly from the book Country Lesbians: The Story of the Womanshare Collective by Sue, Nelly, Dian, Carol, and Billie of the Womanshare Collective

Today, the University of Oregon’s Special Collections Library cholds the largest collection of documentation on the movement. Much of the collection was donated by prominent members such as Ruth and Jean Mountaingrove from Rootworks and Tee Corrine, a lesbian photogrpaher who was active throughout the movement.

Sources

Burmeister, Hetaher Jo. Rural revolution: Documenting the Lesbian Land Communities of Southern Oregon. Portland State University. 2013 Sue, Nelly, Dian, Carol, Billie. Country Lesbians: The Story of Womanshare Collective. Grants Pass, Oregon. Womanshare, 1976